


The Record

by Unicoranglais



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Cabinet Tipping, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-24
Updated: 2020-09-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:07:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26626453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unicoranglais/pseuds/Unicoranglais
Summary: When Jounouchi's high score on Foo Fist Fighters (which is definitely not a terrible game name) is bested by the very mysterious Kiram (which is definitely not just someone's name in reverse), the race is on to get the world record.
Relationships: Marik Ishtar/Jounouchi Katsuya | Joey Wheeler
Comments: 3
Kudos: 4





	The Record

“Ha!”

Jounouchi pounds on the cabinet with his fist, until the whole thing almost tips over and Honda comes away from the airsoft gallery to look at the carnage. “I got the high score! _I got the high score!_ ”

He’s shouting, and he doesn’t care. “You’re shouting,” Honda tells him, and he still doesn’t care. Finally, at long last, Katsuya Jounouchi is The Local Champion of the World at _Foo Fist Fighters_ , and he wants the world to know all about it. 

“I’m gonna be famous. That Kiram Ratshi guy’s held the record for five years! Five _YEARS!_ But now it’s more like Kiram Ratshit! Oh man, I’m gonna be on TV! And they’re not gonna ask me shitty questions about my home life, this time. It’ll be oo, Katsuya, where did you get those amazing gaming biceps? _”_

“You’re shouting again,” Honda tells him, but he clearly doesn’t care either, because he brings it in for a brohug. Jounouchi leaps up and down, up and down and straight back into the cabinet, which he bounces right off, but it goes down with a crash anyway.

“Don’t care! Don’t care! I’m the champion! King of the _video games,_ that’s me! I own that game.”

“You might own it,” Honda grins, grabbing his arm, then his hand, and it occurs to Jounouchi – that’s a little bit gay. He doesn’t care. He’s too damn gay happy to care. “But let’s not have you pay for the whole shebang. Run.”

The arcade owner screams in the distance.

“This’s the happiest day of my life!” Jounouchi proclaims.

* * *

Kiram Ratshi thought his pseudonym very clever, but he is going to have to drop the Ratshi part of it. Now he thinks about it some more, it _is_ rather too close to Ratshit.

He makes amends. Anything for a rival.

* * *

“Huh? But- but I had the high score!”

The new cabinet is bolted to the floor. It’s got a fresh coat of paint on it, too – or maybe it’s a different cabinet entirely. Gone is the peeling white, replaced with smooth silver and little gems. There is a title on the side, in gold filigree: KIRAM: MAXIMUM DIFFICULTY. And then, in smaller letters: (Only for winners. Not for losers.)

“Are you sure this is the same machine?” Yugi asks, shuffling his feet in embarrassment. “Maybe you read the scores wrong.”

Surely he doesn’t think Jounouchi can’t read! Then again, he did just ask that. “I can read!” he barks out anyway. “That Kiram or Karim or Karen or- whoever he is, he’s gone and got the top score again! But I’m up there! Ha, I see he’s too afraid to use his last name now. I bet he’s scared!”

Yugi points to the large, obvious _9999_ next to BigBadBabyDrgn. “Ah, are you sure this is a good idea? It looks like he knocked you down a few places. Maybe a... lot of places. Seems like it might be harder than before, too.”

“I _can_ read!” Jounouchi puffs out his chest. “I’ll get it, you’ll see! You’ll just have to train me harder!”

“I- since when am _I_ -”

“There’s no time to waste!” And he lurches closer to the machine, already checking his pockets for coins.

Yugi’s laughing, but not too much, just in case he gets ‘bro-punched’ for laughing. It’s Honda’s job to take those hits. “You’re shouting!”

 _“I don’t care!_ I’m going to beat you, Kiram!”

* * *

Kiram just smiles, brainwashes the bejeebus out of the arcade owner and his cronies, and plays all night. Too easy for him, even on this harder mode.

* * *

But he only plays! Jounouchi _trains_ , and it is a sight to behold his dedication, how he inches up the ranks despite all the extra enemies now in the game, all the near-impossible jumps and almost mandatory wall glitches that must be performed. It should be on television, Kiram thinks to himself, and as certain people are ever at his beck and call, Jounouchi soon finds himself mobbed by cameras, Honda playing a bodyguard role of sorts as the gamer games his way to glory.

Kiram finds himself lounging often before the screen, eager for updates. Will it be rank eight-hundred today, or perhaps seven-hundred and ninety-nine? And what a training regimen Katsuya Jounouchi has adopted, too - a pleasure to watch. He plays the handheld version of _Foo Fist Fighters_ in the shops and the school corridors, bumping into Honda or Anzu occasionally as they shepherd him about. He plays the console version late into the night, sometimes at Yugi’s place, sometimes at Honda’s. And of course, every day, he goes to the arcade, with this fire in his eyes Kiram hasn’t seen since, well, Yugi. But Jounouchi is no ancient pharaoh, no reincarnation; he’s just Jounouchi, he’s that passionate all the time, and Kiram finds that as intriguing as Yugi clearly finds _Foo Fist Fighters_ training boring.

Perhaps it is even... impressive _._ No- _attractive._ Kiram only meant to compete, of course, to defend his beloved high score at all costs, but now Jounouchi is in his life, he’s not so sure he should be allowed to leave. 

_How far will you go?_ , Kiram wonders, as the numbers tick away. _How far will I?_

* * *

“I’m gonna break in.”

Jounouchi’s looking either confident or desperate; he kind of wears the same expression either way. He always did, even when they were kids. Honda was the one required to wear more sympathetic looks to beg for things.

Honda stares up at the four-storey arcade, and frowns. “Don’t be stupid,” he says, even though they’re both already here, at night, in dark hoodies, so they are totally both about to be very stupid. “It has to be guarded.”

“Guarded! Don’t make me laugh!” says Jounouchi, and laughs. “I don’t see any out the front, do you? And c’mon, I got the 99998 score just earlier. That’d be a world record. So, if I can do it for real on an arcade…”

“…You’ll have the world record and beat Kiram.” Honda sighs, all melodramatic, but he’s smiling really. “Go for it, man.”

* * *

Somehow, Jounouchi comes through a fourth storey window. “I’m gonna get the record! I’m gonna get the record!”

Kiram would run for it, but Jounouchi’s only running for the arcade machines. He must watch this.

Then Honda comes up the stairs, and Kiram changes his mind about staying.

“Hey! Come back here!”

“Was that him? Kiram?”

Kiram darts around them, down the stairs, and Rishid already has the motorbike revving.

…He should probably figure out a pseudonym for Rishid, if he’s going to be coming along much more often. Mind you, Dihsir seems a tad tricky to prounounce.

* * *

“Yes! Finally! Yes! YES! I’m famous! I’m famous!” Jounouchi dances around the room, tackles Honda into the carpet that definitely doesn’t smell like soda and crushed corn chips. “This is it! I’ve done it! Look, look, I’m the pro at this game!”

“Can you not be famous tomorrow,” Honda growls under him, but he lets Jounouchi drag him back over to _Foo Fist Fighters_. “BigBadBabyDrgn,” he reads. Pauses, lets Jounouchi have his little moment.

“Dragon. It’s short for dragon,” Jounouchi manages, then he just can’t take it any more. “Big! Bad! Baby! Dragon! Number _One!_ I’m number one, I did it, I did it! I’m the world record! It only took me fifty goes tonight!”

“You think that was really Kiram, earlier?” Honda leans into the cabinet, all pensive until it turns out someone loosened those bolts; the cabinet tips over and he pretends to totally not have done that. Alarms go off anyway. There’s a familiar scream from downstairs.

Jounouchi laughs. “Run.”

* * *

Why did he run? He’s the number one. He’s the best one. He had no reason to run, and yet…

Jounouchi’s whoop of victory is on every single TV program. Katsuya Jounouchi, World Record Holder for _Foo Fist Fighters._

This isn’t over, Marik thinks. Not by a long shot. Kiram must win in the end.

“If you can’t have the world record, Master Marik,” Rishid tells him as he lies face-down on the couch, “then why not have the world record holder?”

“My _gamer_ name is Kiram”, Marik scoffs, but he’s thinking about it. 

* * *

“Do I _have_ to ask the question about your ‘amazing gamer biceps’?” Mai says, all pouty. She looks extra pouty with all that interviewer-y makeup on. “It’s Kaiba’s station. He may not like it. Besides, we have to make time for the sixty-minute long ‘Kaiba Surprise’.”

Jounouchi grins in a way he thinks is winning. She sighs. The lights come on.

“Welcome to BEWD TV! I’m your host, Mai Kujaku. And now for our special guest! I know him personally, so this should be very exciting.” With the microphone, Mai’s voice projects right around the studio in a way that’s almost unearthly. The lights are bright, even kind of warm. There’s no cheering audience, either. It’s very weird; Jounouchi wonders if he should be there at all.

“Former number-two duelist Katsuya Jounouchi is now the world record holder for Food Fight-”

“Fist Foo Fighters!” Jounouchi corrects her with due haste. “Er, Foo Fist Fighters.” She checks the smudged ink on the back of her hand.

“That is what I said. Anyway, I can’t wait to ask him all about his great win against Kiram, and all the sponsorship deals to come. Well, Jounouchi? What do you think?”

Jounouchi blinks. “Sponsorwhat?”

* * *

“You haven’t won yet, Katsuya!”

In comes a motorbike. Through a door. Possibly several doors, it’s a badass enough motorbike. Jounouchi looks at Mai, like, is this part of the script, and she’s already under the desk, so no, it is not. He shivers in fear.

“It is I! Kiram! Or, as you may also know me…” Marik dismounts gallantly, throws his helmet to the floor, like a knight might... well, if knights did that. There’s no studio audience to see the hotness that is No Helmet Marik, but the crew gasp almost dutifully. 

Jounouchi continues to be stupid, because he is. “Uh, do we get a name?” he hollers. “Your hair’s all messed up, so I don’t know who you care, ‘cos I’m dumb.”

“Marik!” he spits, and Jounouchi flinches. It is a terrifying name, all right. “Yes! Kiram is Marik! I am Kiram! The number one player of _Foo Fist Fight!_ And you – you can never defeat me! Now, show that passion towards me! Love me!”

Jounouchi gasps theatrically and falls to his knees in total defeat, and then they make out lovingly and passionately until Marik wakes up.

The interview is still on television, but it isn’t going the way he wants it to.

* * *

It isn’t going the way Jounouchi wants it to, either. Mai won’t talk about his biceps, first off. Second, there’s a quiz show now. Mai’s just announced that Jounouchi is going to get his own celebrity television quiz show, and Kaiba wants to make him a board game, and… there’s other stuff. Sponsorships. Whatever else. Surprise, says Kaiba. I’m going to give you a ton of meetings and interviews and stuff to do. Hashtag: KaibaSurprise.

He walked to the studio, and he drives home in a limo.

“A flat?” Kaiba sneers. “That won’t work.”

Jounouchi shrugs, and thinks about how he won, and wonders why that doesn’t feel so good anymore.

Kaiba says he’ll find him a better place, inner Domino, surrounded by lush greenery and high fences. Yugi and Honda won’t be allowed in.

* * *

The rivalry felt so good. Why did it feel so good? Was it that look on his face, in his eyes, how he shouted and dug in his heels? Was it the training, so incessant and obstinate?

Was it the fact he was _losing,_ until he wasn't?

The world loves an underdog. Marik grips the edge of the bathroom sink, stares into the mirror, and wonders if Jounouchi would see anything similar in his face. He sees only anger there, himself.

“If I can’t have the world record,” he mutters, “I should have the holder.”

* * *

  
The crime of the century, Mai’s calling it, though she yawned both times she tried to say it. Jounouchi can’t blame her – it’s mere petty theft for most people.

The _Foo Fist Fighter_ arcade machine disappeared in the middle of the night, along with every other arcade machine in the city, and nobody seems to recall how they went or who took them. The CCTV footage shows only hooded men, dragging them away. No word about those sponsorships, thank god- er, what a shame. Just terrible, really. 

The only clue left behind is a note, right where the _Foo Fist Fighter_ cabinet sat: COME AND FIND KIRAM IN REVERSE. Kiram’s signed it, of course. With a little loveheart, clumsily crossed out, but a heart at the end of it nonetheless, blown up for all to see on BEWD TV. Jounouchi’s own heart can’t help but beat a little faster, seeing it. This is either even more straight than he pretends to be, or even more gay than what Honda comes out with on a regular basis. No in-between.

“And you think this is a challenge?” Mai asks him, under the lights.

Jounouchi has no idea, really, but he grins anyway. First time he’s smiled all week, since winning. Feels weird, feels good to have this rivalry back again, this fire in his belly. “Whatever it is, I'm ready for it. I’m coming for you, Kiram in reverse!”

Pause.

_“Oh.”_

* * *

Marik makes a noise and falls off the couch. Rishid comes running. “What happened? Are you okay, master Marik?”

“He got it,” Marik breathes. “He finally understands me.”

* * *

It is said, in a desert somewhere, there is a bunker underground, where over four hundred arcade machines beep and flicker. A lone motorbike makes its way across the sands, bringing one rival to another.

May they game in peace.

**Author's Note:**

> _And when the sun shines down upon us  
>  We'll know we're righteous, babe  
> We survived the crisis, babe  
> And when the sun shines down over Cali  
> We won't need a license  
> 'Cause love will drive us_


End file.
